Latest Blog Entries

One of the more interesting proposals for understanding God’s relation to evil in the natural world is the “free process defense.” Not many realize, however, this proposal comes in two forms. I affirm one not the other.

The new Renovating Holiness book is selling very well! My co-editor, Josh Broward, and I are excited to see the myriad of ways the book is sparking new conversations about what holiness might mean today. Renovating Holiness brings together 100+ Millennial and Xer leaders in the Church of the Nazarene to explore holiness afresh. The […]

I’m happy to announce that a new book I have co-edited with Josh Broward is now available. Renovating Holiness brings together 120+ Millennial and Xer leaders in the Church of the Nazarene to explore holiness afresh. The book that results is nearly 500 pages long! We wanted to include as many voices as possible. And […]

I’ve been thinking about the various paths Christians take to embracing open and relational theology. John Polkinghorne is among those for whom science led to open and relational themes. For Polkinghorne and many other science and religion scholars, it makes sense to say an open and relational God creates an open and relational universe. My […]

Open and process theologies have much in common. But differences also exist. The future of open theology, in my view, will be largely shaped by ongoing conversations between the two theological perspectives. But I expect them to draw closer and their boundaries to blur. In a previous blog essay, I talked about the future of […]

Open theology has matured in many ways since the ground-breading publication of The Openness of God book twenty years ago. I’ve been thinking about what the next twenty years might be for open theology.

In the final chapter of my current book on providence, I address the issue of miracles. This book project is funded as part of a larger grant I received to explore what it means to believe God acts providentially in a world of randomness. Much of my discussion in this last chapter revolves around various […]

Routledge sent copies yesterday of a new book I edited, Theologies of Creation: Creatio Ex Nihilo and Its New Rivals. It explores current thinking about creation out of nothing, and several essays propose alternative theories of creation.

One of the most influential theologians in the latter half of the 20th century, Wolfhart Pannenberg, has died. I sat down with Pannenberg a decade or so ago to talk about his life and thought. For the first time in print, here's my full-length interview with him.

In my current book, I offer a model of providence I call “Essential Kenosis.” One of my main arguments is that this model gives a plausible reason why a loving and powerful God fails to prevent genuine evil. One aspect of my argument, however, addresses what we might call God's "constitution." I find this aspect neglected more than any other by those who address the problem of evil.